Grateful Dead

Too much reality there! That is usually my job. Glad you usurped it. Great observations. Noam Chomsky would be proud of you! I'm not happy about our panacea, the big V&V. I just got the updated statistic the other day -- If I remember correctly: 1 in 13 Americans between the ages of 18 and 65 will be incarcerated at some point in their adult life. One thing I would add to your observations. Our forefathers did a lot of the original stealing from the Indians and the Mexicans. The French, Spanish and Brits were the people who stole from those people and we then stole from them. The US cavalry invented the original biological warfare. Planting smallpox in Indian blankets. It's hard to believe that the USA pays for so many good and worthwhile social and humanitarian programs around the world with it's foreign aid budget (that many people regularly lament). The US would seem to have a very schizophrenic personality if it were a person. I guess even countries can't escape their origins.

There are many contradictions within our society. In Europe, a country this big would have split into 50 countries. That we have banded together as the USA has given us great strength and dominance throughout the planet. But as far as culture and social mores are concerned? We are pretty fractured. That is why you can see such anomalies. There is no doubting there is a nasty streak of violence and vindictiveness running down our backs like the bolt on your snout, Badger (I've always admired the creativity of that picture). Maybe that has something to do with the way we settled our country. We, the invaders, had to displace a lot of people and create our own laws and enforce some type of justice when there was none. To be very fair, Americans can be kind and loving and compassionate to the extreme, as you have pointed out a small example in NYC. The middle of our country is very well known for it's kindness to those in need as recent tornado victims can attest to, as well as many who are just run-of-the-mill unfortunate. In my own town I see panhandlers begging for food being swamped with in-kind and cash donations (perhaps because we are lucky enough to be a prosperous lot and can't stand to see the sight of the less fortunate, at least I like to think so). So, for good or ill, here we are again with our peculiar style of justice being served, no matter what the law says... It is hard to feel sorry for George Zimmerman. Racial profiling is odious and is a sad fact in our country, as is class profiling -- the police harassing those without nice cars and clothes. Lose your step, fall out of grace...

I try to avoid criticising the USA here as it is too easy to make generalisations and offend nice people. But I am at a loss to understand how a country can be so super sensitive on the one hand ( 'NYC schools ban ‘birthday,’ ‘crime,’ ‘dinosaur,’ and ‘divorce’ from tests' see www.davidmcelroy.org/?p=11966) and on the other hand apparently allow its citizens to murder eachother with impunity, surely about the most insensitive thing you can do. Weird.

For 2nd degree murder. The special prosecutor bypassed the Grand Jury. How scary is that? She claimed she could handle this herself and there was no outside pressure or petition by the public to prosecute the case. Hello? Ms. Prosecutor? That is the clearest case of denial I have ever seen by a person of your rank and importance in the justice system (at that level). Obviously there was a tremendous amount of pressure on her to get a charge laid on Zimmerman's head. She knew she couldn't trust a Grand Jury in Florida with the responsibility of bringing that charge so she had to do it herself. Its not that the Grand Jury would be racist (though there is a high probability that the majority of those making that decision would not be peers of Trayvonn Martin), there would also be the probability that Florida's 'Stand Your Ground' law would have been interpreted the same way the police interpreted it -- letting Zimmerman go unprosecuted. There are many questions in this case. More than met the eye. It seems that young Trayvonn fought back against this guy following him. it seems that a camera caught Zimmerman without his face being beat on but after he emerged from the police station he had cuts and bruises. We begin to see the face of Florida justice emerge here. I think it is possible to say that the prosecutor brought a charge of 2nd degree murder to get a plea conviction of manslaughter here so that the foregone conclusion by many comes to be the reality. Justice will not be properly served in this case, though Zimmerman will likely get what he deserves -- Jail-time for a manslaughter conviction. Meanwhile, Stand Your Ground laws all over the country are being looked at and probably will be struck down in many blue states and amended in the red ones. We can only hope. Otherwise? An employee may some day claim that he shot his boss because he felt that he was being threatened with being sacked and that he had to protect himself and his family... Etc., etc., etcetera.

The Opus Dei candidate gave up the fight for the Repulsivecan nomination for president after Mit Romney threatened to dump bucket-loads of money into the Penn. race, Santorum's home state. If Romney had laid waste to Santorum there and then salted the ground so nothing could survive, Santorum's political career would have effectively ended. Poor Rick. If he really had cojones he would have hung in there with his message of being the "true conservative" alternative to Romney. Now the Mitster can shake up the etch-a-sketch and tell us that he really has the working man's best interest in mind. Right. And if you believe that I've got an island in the middle of the Bay Area called Alcatraz that I happen to have inherited from my uncle that I could let you have for a really low price. The place is a mess but it does pull in a lot of tourists... Special discount o if you belong to LDS!

Thanks for the correction Ted. I'm sure that country could really use 240 million tons, but they're not getting any at all. I don't think N. Korea should be rewarded for their scary behavior but in all god conscious I can't support my government's decision to withhold food to starving people. It is beyond the pale. As are the Kim's with their crazy-talk sword rattling. What kind of world do we live in where maniacs like this can rule with nuclear weapons capability? It is like Kim is the crazy cousin in your family. The one who doesn't own a house and drives a beat-up car but has 7 automatic assault rifles and ten thousand rounds of ammunition and is manic depressive but won't take his lithium!

Kim Jong Un is sacrificing the nutritional needs of over 3 million North Koreans so he can rattle his nuclear saber and irritate the Chinese, Japanese, South Koreans and the USA. He's even sent his meager fleet of diesel-electric Sang-O-class and Yono-class submarines out to stir up trouble with the South Korean naval fleet. I wonder how far away US subs and destroyers are?

Another 'Idiot Wind" dedication for the Kim family dynasty in N. Korea. The pictures on the news were incredibly grim. Workers dressed smartly in show factories praise the Kim's almost as if reading from a script. N. Korea is a Stalinist totalitarian country that perpetuates a cult-like following of it's leaders, The crazy Kims are at it again. This time they are launching a missile with a 1000lb payload capacity that is capable of reaching Hawaii or Alaska. At the same time they are building a tunnel to test another nuke. The third in four years. because of these actions the US is holding up shipments of 240 million tons of food for N. Korea's starving masses. This is such an insane situation. The S. Koreans are going crazy, the Japanese are going crazy. The Taiwanese are quaking in their boots. N. Korea is a rook of China on the international chessboard and nobody believes Kim is playing with a full deck. He's more than a little "toys in the attic" Sleep tight, America. This is another flashpoint for WWIII.

Is always a pretty flower, Sher Bear! Blessings to you like a shower of roses!

"Every picture tells a story, don't it."